Friday, 11 January 2008

Memory

This is the second poem I'm planning to commit to memory as a whole, instead of in half-recalled scraps. It also, maybe incidentally, acts as a corrective to the over-devout tones of the final verse of my first choice, by John Clare. In fact, reading it again, it acts as a corrective to the entire poem. As Joni Mitchell once, memorably, said: A little yin yang there for you, folks.' It's by Frank O'Hara.

After the first glass of vodkayou can accept just about anythingof life even your own mysteriousnessyou think it is nice that a boxof matches is purple and brown and is calledLa Petite and comes from Swedenfor they are words that you know and thatis all you know words not their feelingsor what they mean and you write becauseyou know them not because you understand thembecause you don't you are stupid and lazyand will never be great but you dowhat you know because what else is there?

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Personal information

Born in England, I've been living in central Italy since 1980. My début novel - LITTLE MONSTERS - was published by Picador on 7 March 2008. The paperback came out on 6 February 2009. A collection of short fiction, entitled THE SCENT OF CINNAMON AND OTHER STORIES, is now available from Salt Publishing. The title story was selected as one of the O. Henry Prize Stories 2007. My second novel, ANY HUMAN FACE, was published by Picador on 7 May 2010 and came out in paperback in November 2011. In February 2014, my new novel, THE VIEW FROM THE TOWER (Exhibit A) will be published along side a memoir (WITH A ZERO AT ITS HEART, The Friday Project).
(Photo credit: Patrizia Casamirra)